For audiences growing tired of the MCU’s multiverse madness, the childish and irreverent Thor: Love and Thunder feels like a welcome escape.
★★★✰✰
Overburdened with a self-seriousness and distinct lack of creativity, Marvel’s phase 4 has been underwhelming to say the least. The time is ripe, then, for Thor: Love and Thunder, which features the god of lightning riding a flying Viking ship kitted out like Tom Cruise’s island bar from Cocktail and pulled across the sky by screaming goats, to take things down a peg. Following on from the much-praised and offbeat Thor: Ragnarok, Taika Waititi once again captures lightning in a bottle by channelling his unique brand of comedy into the MCU.
Like Ragnarok before it, Thor: Love and Thunder again embraces the sounds and aesthetics of classic rock—this time with the royalty cheque being made out to Guns N’ Roses. An opening monologue swiftly moves things on from the events of Endgame (not least, the problematic “Fat Thor” meme) to a Thor (Chris Hemsworth) once again on the top of his game. An early fight with the Guardians—more spectators than support—demonstrates that Thor has certainly rediscovered his thunder, but what it turns out he’s still missing is love. This soon materialises with the reintroduction of his former girlfriend Jane (Natalie Portman) wielding his former hammer Mjölnir, which itself creates a jealous (but undeniably hilarious) love triangle with his current axe Stormbreaker.
In the background to all this a dangerous new villain, Gorr the God Butcher (Christian Bale), starts to catch Thor’s attention by, as his name suggests, killing gods. Gorr is given a sympathetic, but noticably light, character arc which remarkably still stands head over heels above the recent Marvel villains. A lot of this is down to Bale’s performance, contorting his body in unsettling ways and generally having fun playing such an erratic figure, but what makes his quest to destroy the gods particularly engrossing is, to put it simply—he kind of has a point. Marvel’s latest theatrical release, Multiverse of Madness, squandered the fine character work done across nine episodes of WandaVision by turning Wanda Maximoff into a maternal maniac within the first half-hour. In stark contrast to this, the first ten minutes of Love and Thunder give Gorr a believable origin which doubles as an early audience gut punch.
However, it’s not all smooth sailing as a cancer diagnosis is revealed in crass fashion through quips, and an early joke about New Asgard surcomming to the plight of commercialisation feels as if it’s being made by the wrong multi-billion dollar studio. But the main attraction here is undoubtably Waititi’s humour, and with the film being bookended by monologues delivered by the director, much of the runtime feels like gazing into his own comedic stream of consciousness. In a year when the Marvel Machine has remained dull and formulaic even with filmmakers like Sam Raimi or Chloé Zhou taking charge, it’s to Waititi’s credit that he manages to produce something that, for better or worse, feels so unique. Sure, the same problems that have plagued the MCU for years are present—decietful shallow focus fails to distract from patchty CGI for one— but the complete absence of the multiverse, the more intimate stakes, and a refusal to shamelessly set up future films is very welcome here. Even if it does leave you questioning, in Guns N’ Roses fashion, “Where do we go now?”
The Verdict
Thor: Love and Thunder is a fun, frenetic entry into the MCU which stands out amongst the disappointing Phase 4 entries. It’s refusal to engage with the wider MCU is refreshing, but can’t help but make the character arc at its core feel a little inconsequential in the grand scheme of things.
Words by Jake Abatan
Support The Indiependent
We’re trying to raise £200 a month to help cover our operational costs. This includes our ‘Writer of the Month’ awards, where we recognise the amazing work produced by our contributor team. If you’ve enjoyed reading our site, we’d really appreciate it if you could donate to The Indiependent. Whether you can give £1 or £10, you’d be making a huge difference to our small team.